


The Tide

by Ginny_Potter



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, DH Era, F/M, Flashbacks, Fluff and Angst, Lie Low At Lupin's (Harry Potter), M/M, Non-Explicit Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-25
Updated: 2019-03-25
Packaged: 2019-12-07 11:52:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18234500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ginny_Potter/pseuds/Ginny_Potter
Summary: Summer 1997.After his wedding, Remus comes back to his father's place in Weston-super-mare with Tonks. It triggers some memories.





	The Tide

**Author's Note:**

> Hullo!  
> Back again.  
> A day-trip to Weston-super-mare gave me some (angsty) ideas and I had to do something about it.  
> So yes, some Remadora, some Wolfstar and a lot of feels.
> 
> I am not a native speaker, so please tell me if I made a mess.
> 
> Enjoy!

“So, you grew up here?”

Dora had warm hands. Remus was focussing on that, on how warm her left hand felt inside his right. How small it was, two fingers curled on the soft space between his thumb and index, the others pressed against his palm, enclosed in his much bigger hand. She had small hands, small and warm and not sweaty. It was odd, holding her hand.

“Quite so,” he answered, when he realized she had asked a question. “Before I was… attacked, my family had a cottage on the other side of the channel,” he waved his free hand vaguely in the direction of the sea.

Tonks was beaming, hair bubble gum pink, shiny earrings climbing up her ear like ivy. Remus wanted to leave a path of tiny, feathery kisses there, one after the other, from the lobe to the helix. He smiled.

“So, you are actually from Wales!” she said cheerfully, “That’s lovely. Explains that slight inflection you have. And the rolled ‘ar-s’.”

Remus’ smile faltered slightly.

 

_“Sounds like music.”_

_“Shut up, Sirius.”_

_“‘t’s true. Shuu-d aap, Sirrrius. It’s like a song. A song about me, of course.”_

 

“I don’t know,” he said slowly, eyes on the pier. “I lived all around the place for many years.”

Tonks shrugged and let go a happy sigh, dangling their arms like little children do, her grasp strong and at the same time gentle, as if she was giving him the chance to let go. The little golden band around her ring finger sparkled in the sunshine. Remus felt his heartbeat accelerate. He didn’t want to let go.

“I like that we can stay here until they call us,” she broke the comfortable silence after a while. “But we will have a proper honeymoon, after the war ends.”

Remus’ stomach clenched. _After the war ends._ He couldn’t think about a world after the war, it was unfathomable. He had never been able to, not even during the first one. Everything was uncertain, doomed; it always felt as though they didn’t have time. And they didn’t.

 

_“I don’t think we should…”_

_Rustle of fabric._

_“Stop with the thinking, Moony.”_

 

No time. It felt like that when he had kissed Dora the day before, in a godforsaken little church in Scotland, white and yellow daffodils in her bright turquoise hair. She had worn a long, hippy dress with wide sleeves and fringes on the hem and ribbons weaved together on her breast like a medieval tunic. It had felt like they had no time and they had to do it because the war was there, an everyday reality, and they _had to_ be happy before… something happened. They _deserved_ it: a happy ending. Everyone wanted them to have their happily ever after. As he cradled her heart-shaped young face in his hands he had wondered if James had felt the same way, a spring day not so different from that, so many years before, if he had kissed Lily Evans in the same exact way at their wedding because he wanted to always remember how that beautiful, beaming woman looked in a white dress, a veil on her fiery hair and a blissful smile on her face.

He tightened his hold on Dora’s hand.

“Why did you choose this place?” she asked quietly, after a while. She had stopped to gather a seashell.

“I didn’t, it was my father’s last address,” he licked his chapped lips. “The house was his.”

Dora played with the pearly seashell, attempting a Muggle trick, but the shell slipped out of her sleeve before she could reach Remus’ ear. He laughed. She mumbled, “Bugger,” and gave him a push with her shoulder, before leaning against him. Remus’ laugh faded in a fond smile; he slipped his arms around her waist tentatively, resting his chin on the top of her head. She smelled of sea, salt and sand and something sweet and loving and feminine. The wind was quite chilly for July and whipped their cheeks and made them shiver. They looked towards the sea, towards the strip of dark sand that cut the low tide, a few feet beyond the warning sign in the middle of the beach. The sun was bright in the clear sky.

“I’m glad we can stay here,” she murmured. “It is quiet and secluded.”

 

_“Dumbledore told me to lie low at yours for a while.”_

 

Remus wasn’t sure what to say, he blinked. “It is. I imagine my dad wanted me to… well, have a place, if necessary,” he paused, then added, flippantly. “There is a cellar too.”

Tonks turned in his hug, so to look at him in the eye, “We will have the Wolfsbane Potion after the war, Remus.”

_After the war._

He tried to smile, “Of course. I was just saying.”

 _But the next moon is in four days,_ he wanted to add. _And I won’t have the Potion._ And then, quite bitterly – unjustly so, because he knew Dora, he knew it was just absent-mindedness, he knew she simply didn’t keep track of the phases of the moon, she wasn’t used to it yet – _I will have to use that this time, it is in four days and you forgot_.

 

_“Bugger, it will rain.”_

_Rubbing eyes._

_“What? When?”_

_“Next full. James wanted us to check that clearing on the centaurs’ territory, for the Map.”_

_“Oh. Next full. Almost forgot.”_

_“Don’t worry, Moony.”_

_An extremely precise lunar calendar – 1976 to 1980 – swung in front of his face._

_“Gotcha for the next few.”_

 

Remus gritted his teeth. That was simply unfair. It wasn’t her fault. Stupid brain. Stupid memories.

They started walking again, fingers intertwined, feet in the wet sand.

“You lived in Yorkshire before, right?”

Remus looked at her quizzically. He didn’t remember saying so. She just shrugged.

“I lived in a cottage there for a couple years, before teaching at Hogwarts,” he confirmed. “I had a job in Upper Flagley when Dum– ” his breath hitched, he cleared his throat; it was still painful, “when Dumbledore contacted me.”

They stopped near the entrance of the pier and Tonks insisted in buying Muggle candy floss from a middle-aged woman that looked at their odd couple as if she thought that the world was going to the dogs. The sugary cloud matched Dora’s hair almost exactly. She dived into it. Remus kissed some of it off her cheeks and she chuckled fondly.

“Then what happened?”

“Uh?” Oh, she was back on the Yorkshire thing. “Oh, I couldn’t go back to a half-magic village. Everyone knew I was a werewolf at that point,” there wasn’t any bitterness in it, not anymore, maybe there had never been. “I came here. I worked on some research for an academic journal and I had a Muggle job at the Helicopter Museum,” he smiled at her confused expression. “It’s a vehicle Muggles use to fly. And there is a museum to show some old models adopted in the past and such.” He explained, stealing some of the candy floss and smiling amused when she stepped on his bare foot in retaliation.

“How did you manage with your transformations?” she asked, curiously.

Remus avoided her big dark eyes, “I managed. Dumbledore sent the Wolfsbane.” _And there’s a cellar. I already told you._

_And there was a dog. Sometimes._

 

_The dog was there. How could it be? The wolf was happy. They were very old friends._

_You shouldn’t be here, the man trapped inside the wolf wanted to scream. It’s dangerous, what the fuck are you doing here?_

_But the big black dog stayed, wet nose against the wolf’s snout._

_Why don’t we go? Why don’t we run like we used to? he was asking._

_The wolf curled on himself, a paw covering his eyes, huddled in a corner of the cellar. He felt the nose against his snout all night, sometimes the soothing touch of the dog’s raspy tongue. He drifted into sleep at some point._

_The morning after, the man was alone._

“Then Voldemort came back…” she said, almost conversationally.

_Then Sirius came back, raggedy and hollow-eyed and grim on my doorstep._

Remus nodded.

 

*

 

Then Sirius came back, raggedy and hollow-eyed and grim on his doorstep.

It was dark and excessively hot outside. Remus’ windows were open wide, and he was writing a survey – under a pseudonym of course – for ‘Contra Obscuras Artes’, a scholarly journal dedicated to the study of the systems of defence against the Dark Arts. Deadline: the end of the month. He lifted a hand to his mouth, wiping the sweat from his upper lip.

Suddenly, a frenetic knocking.

Remus reached instinctively for his wand. He got up, paying attention not to drag the chair against the uneven floor. He walked silently to the door and glimpsed outside the window: he could see who was there without being seen back. His heart plummeted when he recognised the tall, eerie ghost. He opened the door without thinking it twice.

Sirius’ expression was dark, “Wotcher, Moony, work to do.”

“Hello to you, Sirius,” he stepped back to let him enter. He didn’t flinch at the nickname and it was particularly proud of it. Sirius looked awful. “What happened?” he asked, closing the door.

Something must have happened if Sirius was there, more than a year after he had seen him last in human form.

He went straight for the cold chimney and grabbed the Floo Powder. He waved a hand – he had no wand and he didn’t seem bothered by it – and a crackling fire started to burn, blue and purple flames racing in the air, “Long story short: Voldemort’s back, Harry almost died, we have to gather the old crew.” He threw the Floo Powder in the hearth.

Remus gaped, “Wait, what?”

 

Sirius was licking melted ice cream from his long fingers and Remus wasn’t able to take his eyes off him. The wind was blowing, cool and refreshing against their sweaty, hot skin, and Sirius’ legs were dangling from the pier. The gusts of wind were tangling Sirius’ long hair, half glued to his sticky face, covered in vanilla cream.

“Fuck, it’s fucking impossible…” he was mumbling, frustrated.

Remus chuckled. “I had warned you it was windy. I told you ‘Don’t get the ice-cream, Sirius.’”

He glared at him, then lapped vigorously all along his forearm, finally focussing on his wrist with intent. Remus looked away, feeling a blush spreading along his neck and cheeks. He crossed his legs for good measure. For once, it didn’t seem that Sirius was doing it on purpose.

“Why Weston-fucking-super-mare?” he growled, after the umpteenth impetuous gust of wind, accidentally spreading ice cream all over, up to his cheekbone.

Remus intertwined his fingers to prevent himself from doing something rash, and shrugged. “Ask my father.”

“Cannot. Dead.”

“Very thoughtful, Sirius.”

He raised his grey, shining eyes. “Sorry,” he mumbled, half-quizzically, as though he wasn’t sure what he did wrong. A sixteen-year old in Dumbledore’s office overlapped with this foreign, changed man.

Remus lifted a hand and cupped his face, brushing his cheek with his thumb.

It was one day since Sirius had come back, raggedy and hollow-eyed and grim on his doorstep.

 

“What’s his name?”

Remus winced, his hands still deep in Padfoot’s fur, scratching behind his ears and trying to extricate the twig from his jaws. They had been playing fetch on the beach for a while. It was a beautiful, sunny summer day and Remus’ bare feet sank in the wet sand, his tattered jeans folded up. He turned towards the voice: it was a little girl with pigtails and a rainbow swimsuit. Her eyes were big and hazel, inquisitive.

“Padfoot,” Remus said, gently. “You can pet him if you want, he is very well-behaved.”

The girl looked behind her back. Her mother was sitting on a multicoloured towel, she had long, ginger hair, braided at the top of her head. She gave her daughter a smile of encouragement. When she turned back, she yelped. Padfoot was sitting very close now, head tilted, his tail wagging. She giggled and patted him on his snout. Padfoot sneezed and the girl squealed in delight, hugging him around his neck.

Remus chuckled and looked at them playing and rolling in the sand with a soft smile, until the woman with ginger hair called her child back, and Padfoot nudged his hand.

It was two days since Sirius had come back, raggedy and hollow-eyed and grim on his doorstep.

 

It was night and they were kissing, pressed against one of the wooden poles that supported the pier above them. Sirius’ tongue was in his mouth and his hands were grasping Remus’ shirt and his knee was pressing between his thighs and their bare feet were sinking in the mud, the water caressing their calves. The air smelled like seaweed and salt and sweat and summer. Remus grinded against Sirius’ knee, gasping in his mouth for relief. His head was spinning.

Sirius drew back, a breathless laugh on his swollen lips. If Remus concentrated, if he didn’t think about the soft gasps Sirius made, pushing against his hip, if he shut off the constant sloshing of the sea, he could hear children laughing and parents chatting and the piercing noises coming from the arcade, above them.

But Sirius was all over him, big hands, burning and sweaty, under his shirt, on his chest, his neck, his arse; fingers digging in his flesh. He could only feel Sirius touching him, grasping every bit of skin he could find. He had always loved Sirius’ hands, elegant with well-groomed nails, like those of a pianist, his wand hand slightly callous. He had loved feeling them all over him. Sirius’ hands now were bony and spidery and pale as ghosts, but they were real. And Remus didn’t care about anything else, honestly.

He bit his lower lip, tasting the blood, and Sirius moaned and laughed and breathed hard and fast against him, and the water sloshed around their feet, and the wind blew, pushing Sirius' long hair inside their mouths, in their kiss, in a mess of locks and lips and fingers and entangled limbs.

Sirius was real and he was there, and Remus thanked a God he didn’t believe in.

It was three days since Sirius had come back, raggedy and hollow-eyed and grim on his doorstep.

 

“Here you are.”

Remus sighed and it felt as though a mountain had been lifted from his chest. Sirius was on the beach, he was doodling on the sand with his finger, a fag between his lips. The sun was setting slowly, painting him gold. He sat beside him, looking at the waves softly caressing the farthest extremity of the pier. The wind was blowing, strong as ever, slipping under the shirt that Remus had lent Sirius, blowing it up like that of a hero in a Romantic painting. Sirius’ jet-black locks were flapping in the air angrily. He looked out of one of Byron’s poems.

“Sorry,” Sirius chewed on the filter of the homemade fag. “I needed…”

“I know. Just don’t… disappear when I am taking a shower. I come up with crazy thoughts. Like… you seduced and abandoned me,” he shrugged.

The left corner of Sirius’ mouth curled up. “Is that what you thought?”

Remus nodded, pushing his shoulder against Sirius’ playfully. He was warm, his skin red where it had been exposed to the sun.

“You thought I seduced and abandoned you. Not that the Death Eaters kidnapped and/or tortured me. Or that the Aurors arrested me.”

Remus took the fag from Sirius’ lips and inhaled a mouthful of smoke. He gave it back without looking at him, eyes fixed on the approaching tide. “Yes.”

Sirius hummed, then sunk his feet deeper in the muddy sand.

Remus looked at the water climbing the shore. “You know,” he said, matter-of-factly, “if we stay here, in less than a minute the water will reach us, and we will sink in the mud and drown.”

Sirius hummed again and leaned back on his hands, closing his eyes.

“Shall we stay?” Remus looked at Sirius, at his bent neck and his closed eyes and the way in which his hair caressed his distended forearms. The setting sun created so many deep shadows on that fragile body that if he concentrated, he could believe they were seventeen again, camping in Northern Wales during the summer after Hogwarts. That was his Patronus memory.

He wondered if he could ever be able not to wish he had that Sirius back. He wondered if he would ever feel not guilty for wanting that Sirius back. He wondered if there actually were two different Sirius, or if it was just him, not used to feel something after so many years. And Sirius… Sirius had always managed to make him feel _so much_.

Sirius opened one eye as the first rivulets of water brushed his toes. And smiled.

It was four days since Sirius had come back, raggedy and hollow-eyed and grim on his doorstep.

 

*

 

“…and you moved to Grimmauld Place.”

Remus nodded again.

_And five days later I moved to Grimmauld Place._

“And then we met,” her eyes were dark and full of emotion.

Remus smiled and nodded again, tucking her hair behind her ears and leaning down to kiss her slowly on the lips. He could feel her smile. When he drew back, he brushed his nose against hers and she frowned and laughed and pushed him back, tickly.

They walked along the pier until its farthest extremity. They looked at the sunset, sticky fingers intertwined and wind howling. Remus glanced at the water slowly climbing the muddy shore.

“Look, Remus!” Tonks exclaimed, excited, pointing at the sea, at the foot of the pier, as the bank rapidly transformed into quicksand.

But Remus looked farther towards Knightstone, at the spot in which two years before Sirius Black had sat, hands in the sand, long hair caressing his arms, eyes closed, golden light painting his skin, forever stuck in a limbo between past and present.

He smiled.

 

* 

 

They were walking on the promenade, drenched and covered in mud.

“It comes and goes, you know?”

“What?”

“The tide,” Sirius’ bare feet were long and white and out of place against the smooth tiles. “It comes and goes. It arrives when you least expect it, messes things up, then goes away, leaving back only ruins and destruction.”

“Very poetic, Padfoot.”

Sirius grinned and kept looking in front of him. He went on. “And when you think you have settled everything, it just comes back and every time you have to rebuild from scratch.”

Remus dangled his boat shoes by their laces. “Maybe you are just pretty stupid to build where it can reach you.”

Sirius shrugged and his knuckles brushed against the back of Remus’ hand. “Maybe you can’t help it.”

They kept walking towards Remus’ cottage, beyond Kightstone, beyond the old Birnbeck Pier, fingers brushing.

“We could have sunk and drowned, Pads.”

“We didn’t though.”

A pause.

“We didn’t though.”

 

*

 

Remus’ closed his eyes and pressed his lips against Dora’s soft hair.

_I didn’t though._

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own anything except the angsty feels that can come from this.


End file.
